Mike Grimes, Lancaster, CA has recently completed an overhaul on a LeBlond 7 cylinder 7D iron cylinder 90 HP engine for Rick Livington's St. Louis Cardinal. Rick and the aircraft are at Columbia Airport in California. Folks who fly "Lil' Round Engines" in Rearwins, Porterfields, and a few other types using LeBlonds know how much work it takes to get a good engine. Here's Mike's story on the engine overhaul:

When the engine was originally torn down about six years ago it
was found to have a cracked crankshaft, master rod and one
piston. Not knowing how or where to get replacement parts the
cleaned parts were reassembled to make a static display engine.

When the engine was placed in my hands I was able to locate the
required parts through the generous help of a lot of friends and
their contacts. The worst part was that the engine had been
previously been worked on by a person(s) who had no business being
near an airplane, much less working on one. All of the front cover
studs had been stripped out of the crankcase and replaced with bolts
that had about 2/3 of their heads ground off. Several of the
cylinder hold down studs had been stripped also. The crankcase had
to be set up in a P&W jig borer in order to recut the stud holes with
an end mill so they could be helicoiled to again accept the proper
studs. The accessory case studs had also been stripped out and the
holes retapped to 3/8". This required making custom studs with 3/8"
threads on one end and 5/16" threads on the other end. There was not
enough metal left in the case casting to allow for overboring and
installing thread inserts.

The replacement master rod was a late style that takes bearing
inserts. It was in an unfinished condition so some machine work and
polishing had to be done to complete it along with making a new pin
bushing. Off the shelf bearing inserts were acquired to fit the rod
and crankpin combination.

The replacement piston was +.020" oversize and had to be machined
down to standard size.

The replacement crankshaft was from a 5 cylinder engine so after
magnaflux, polishing and shot peening the old 7 cylinder
counterweights were installed on it.

All of the valves were worn out or ground to a razor edge so new
valves were made using Ford valves as blanks.

Several valve guides had to be made to replace guides that were loose
in their respective heads. This engine has one piece, cast iron,
cylinders with integral heads. The original paper cylinder base
gaskets were discarded and the cylinder bases sealed with O-200
cylinder base O-rings. All new paper gaskets were made for the
crankcase, accessory case, oil pump and magneto drive joints. Rick
says it doesn't leak much oil but it certainly flings grease in every
imaginable direction.

This is an old two main bearing engine so it will only be a matter of
time before the crankshaft cracks or breaks from precessional
loads. Hopefully the polishing and shot peening will lengthen its
service life.

Rick has installed the engine on the early model St. Louis Cardinal and has run it. He's now waiting on a propeller before flying.